The Mikhailo Lomonosov 300 (MVL-300) mission
was a Russian high-energy astrophysics satellite. It was named to honor the
300th anniversary of the birth of the Russian polymath Mikhail
Vasilyevich Lomonosov. It was designed by the M. V. Lomonosov Moscow State
University (MGU; itself named after the same intellectual). The
mission’s purpose was the study gamma-ray bursts
at multiple wavelengths, and study transient phenomena in the Earth’s
upper atmosphere.
The mission was launched on April 28, 2016 from the Russian Vostochny
(Eastern) spacedrome into a polar sun-synchronous orbit aboard the Soyuz 2-1a
Volga rocket.
The spacecraft bus was based on the mission-proven Kanopus platform.
Lomonosov originally had a three year planned lifespan, but roughly ten months
shy of that milestone, the data transmission system failed and specialists
from MGU and VNIIEM Corporation (the satellite builder) were unable to restore
operations.
The Lomonosov mission studied cosmic rays at extremely high energies
(1019–1020 eV) in search of the predicted
GZK spectral cutoff, detected and studied gamma-ray burst sources, as well
as upper atmospheric energic events, including local weather-induced events
(e.g. “sprites”s from active thunderstorms), magnetospheric events,
and air shower events from cosmic rays striking the Earth’s upper
atmosphere.